


another year

by skuls



Category: The X-Files
Genre: F/M, birthday shit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-16
Updated: 2016-07-16
Packaged: 2018-07-24 10:23:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,584
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7504641
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/skuls/pseuds/skuls
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mulder celebrates Scully's birthday vs Scully celebrates Mulder's birthday. </p><p>(askbox prompt that got out of hand)</p>
            </blockquote>





	another year

**Author's Note:**

> this is too fucking long for it's own damn good. the timeline here on some of these is kind of me trying to make sense of these episodes so it’s kind of out of skew here shhh i like it. also headcanon that my struggle took place in october because i'm sorry but that mess of six episodes DID NOT take place over six weeks. no way.  
> also i wrote most of this mess on my phone rip.
> 
> (original post: http://how-i-met-your-mulder.tumblr.com/post/147507105263/how-about-mulder-celebrates-scullys-birthday-vs)

**_his_ **

i.

Being back in the office is kind of strange. It's been a few months since she's been in it, of course, and she didn't really expect to be back after leaving. Mulder’s almost different, too. He’s less animated, stares at her like he thinks she might break.

(They've only talked on the phone since his visit to the hospital. She'd prop the receiver between her shoulder and ear, sitting on the couch under at least three blankets at her mother's demand, with his videotape in her lap. She's missed him.)

“I missed your birthday,” she says. She reaches into her bag, past the tape, to the snowglobe she'd picked up at the hospital gift shop. It had a mini version of the Lincoln Memorial in it, which is kind of stupid, but it works.

“It wasn't very memorable,” Mulder says softly. The first thing he'd asked when she'd gotten to the office was how did she feel. Was she sure she was ready to be back. Scully can't help but feel a prick of annoyance at this. She's heard nothing but questions about her wellbeing since she woke up. She feels like less of a federal agent and more of an invalid. She thought Mulder, at least, would be normal.

“I would've gotten you a present,” she says, curling her fingers around the snowglobe at the bottom of her bag.

“You don’t owe me anything, Scully,” he says quietly, not quite looking at her. He blames himself; that much is clear. He's afraid it'll happen again.

“You saved me,” she says.

Mulder’s head snaps up, surprised. “I didn't save you, Scully,” he says, too gently, like she wouldn't understand. “I didn't do much except wave my gun at the sky.”

 _You came after me,_ she thinks. _You held my hand. You said you didn't want me to go. You cared._

 _You were one of the reasons I came back,_ she thinks.

 

ii.

“You should be resting,” is the first thing he says to her.

Scully crosses her arms, and gives him a stern look. “Mulder, I've been in remission for months. I'm coming back to work soon. I've recovered. I think I'll be okay at your apartment.”

He smiles, just a little. “Why are you here?”

She smirks a little back. “It's your birthday,” she says. “And unlike _some_ people, I remember people's birthdays.”

“Oh, Scully, you wound me.” But he's smiling fully now, and he steps aside to let her in.

“Any big plans?” she asks.

“I think my evening's pretty clear.” He's looking at her funny, like he didn't expect her to be spending the evening, even his birthday, with him. She almost feels the need to reassure him that she does. She's barely seen him in these months of recovery - her mother and Bill basically moved into the apartment, and Tara had flown down to visit. Their communication has been limited to phone calls. He's been on suspension for his ordeal with the man in his apartment, and she's not exactly sure what he's been doing. She's missed him.

“Good.” Scully removes a cellophane package from her purse and tosses it to him. “Birthday Twinkie.”

He catches it, and grins like a kid. “Would this have anything to do with a certain birthday Snowball?”

“Maybe.” She shrugs innocently, ducking her head to hide her smile. “Got any candles?”

He doesn’t have candles. They end up on either side of his couch, knees pulled up to their chests, bare feet barely touching in the center. (“No shoes on the couch, Scully,” he says. “Oh, like you've ever cared about dirt,” she says.) Mulder offers her half the package, and breaks his own in half, cream oozing out on his fingers. He eats one half, and offers her the other. She shakes her head - she's gained most of the cancer-lost weight back, anyway.

“Your brother still in town?” he asks finally, his toes poking at hers.

“No, his wife is pregnant, due in a couple months, and they wanted to be getting ready,” she replies carefully. Mulder never said anything, but Bill made his disdain for her partner clear in the weeks he and Tara had spent on her couch bed. _It was my choice, Bill_ , she'd always replied steadily. It’s her feelings for him that are questions she doesn't know how to answer. “You talked to your mother today?” she asks out of curiosity. The only thing she really knows about Teena Mulder from personal experience is that she slapped her son when he asked questions about his sister while Scully was in the other room. But now she wonders if they contacted her when Mulder faked his death. She wonders if Mulder had to call her and explain. She wonders what Teena Mulder felt in that moment.

“No,” Mulder says with a whoosh of breath. He sighs. “Scully, I should probably tell you something.”

He tells her about seeing Samantha in the diner while she was sick. Samantha, who regarded the smoker as her father. “She hasn't tried to contact me since,” he says. “I thought she might today, but…”

Scully feels a rush of sympathy. “Oh, Mulder.” She reaches out and squeezes his knee comfortingly.

“I don't think she was real,” he says softly.

Scully squeezes his knee again, thinks about getting closer and hugging him, kissing his cheek the way he had in her hospital room. “I'm sorry, Mulder,” she says again.

He looks at her again, and smiles. “It's okay, Scully. I've got a birthday Twinkie-” He waves the cream-smeared cellophane at her. “-and great company. I'll be fine.”

What he means, she thinks, is _I'm glad you're alive._ She's more and more glad herself everyday, she thinks, as his warm hand covers hers, fingers splayed out over her freckled skin.

 

iii.

She turns around as he exits the bedroom, pressing against him as she kisses him. “Happy birthday,” she mutters low in his ear.

He always looks half surprised when she kisses him, like he can't quite believe it, features stretching out into a smile as he kisses her again. “Hey, Scully,” he mutters back, fingers pressing to the small of her back. It has a whole new level of intimacy when they're facing each other, she thinks.

“I brought some food,” she says. “I thought we could watch a movie.”

“ _Caddyshack_?” he teases.

She shakes her head. “ _Steel Magnolias_ ,” she says seriously. For a moment, he looks like he believes her, and she laughs. “ _Sixth Sense_ , actually. You'll like it, it's a ghost story. And you won't figure out the ending to this one.”

“Come on, Scully,” he protests. “I always figure out the endings to movies.”

“Not this one,” she promises, smiling knowingly. “Trust me.”

“I always do,” he says seriously, leading her to the couch.

Hours later, she's half asleep, curled against him like he's a pillow on this stupid couch of his, and he's muttering into her hair, “You're right, I didn't see that coming.”

“Mmm,” she says, tipping her head back with her eyes still closed. When he kisses her, he tastes like chocolate.

“We had a case like that, didn't we?” he says to her hairline. “Remember Chester?”

“Mmm,” she says again. “Mulder, shut up.” And she's curling her fists in his t-shirt. She's tired, and sleeping on the couch cannot be good for them, but she doesn't want to move.

“Speaking of cases,” he says because he never listens. “I think the FBI is going to be on our back about budget soon.”

Scully sighs impatiently. “Who cares,” she says, without opening her eyes. “They're always on our backs about something.”

“That's true,” he says softly. The credits music cuts off abruptly, plunging the space on the other side of her eyelids into darkness. He kisses her head, and she smiles against his shirtfront.

 

iv.

It should be different, she thinks. They should have an apartment, or a house, or something, and their living room should be littered with toys. And she should be getting up before him - almost impossible, but oh well - and sneaking to the kitchen to make coffee. And she should be waking up their son, who's been excited about this for weeks because birthdays mean cake, and who has a card ready, sloppy toddler letters spelling out _Daddy_ in crayon. They should be sneaking back into the bedroom, she should be lifting William onto the bed, and he should be giggling so loud that he'd wake Mulder up, socked feet digging into his ribs, and Mulder should be smiling up at them sleepily, kissing his son's head and then her while William sings most of the right words to _Happy Birthday_ …

She rolls over the length of a motel bed, and whispers, “Happy birthday”, kissing his cheek. He mutters something, and goes back to sleep.

When he wakes up, later, he kisses her softly and suggests they get moving, offers to take the first driving shift. She holds his hand on the way to the car. She loves him. They are not happy. _It's never going to be the same as it was,_ she thinks.

 

v.

She picks up two coffees on the way to work, because she saw it on a cop show once, and even though it’s a corny fucking move, she's not sure what the protocol is for separated FBI agents on the first day back to the office. (Mulder likes coffee, anyways, she'd know.) Her ring is in her pocket, and she fidgets with it absently. It is his birthday. She has no idea what to say.

She's looking forward to being back. She shouldn't - she is romanticizing it, she tells herself, and her mother thinks it's a bad idea. God only knows what Bill would think if they ever talked anymore. But still. She's missed _them_ , arguing in a basement office, bad suits and guns in hand, chasing lights in the sky. Part of her wants her husband and son back, another part of her wants to turn back time and lock the doors of the damn car, never stop driving to new and strange places with him. _It won't be the same,_ she's told herself. _This could be what you need,_ she's told herself.

He's not there when she gets there, which is strange. He was always in first, at ungodly hours of the morning. She scouts out the renovated office with curiosity. One damn desk, one damn nameplate. She's going to say something to Skinner herself. She waits. The coffee gets cold, and she throws it out. He shows up just as she's started to worry. “Hey, Scully,” he says quietly.

Her head snaps up to look at him. “Where have you…” she starts, remembers she has no right to fuss over him, not anymore.

“Long commute.” He shrugs, and suddenly, back in the place where it all started, she loves him so much it hurts. She wants to tell him to come stay with her. She sticks her hand in her pocket and holds her ring again.

“Happy birthday, Mulder,” she says instead, and offers him a smile to tell him that she is not going anywhere.

He smiles back. “Welcome back, Agent Scully.”

 

**_hers_ **

i.

He leans almost fully against the hospital wall, turned away from all the agents down the hall. He and Scully have been interviewed repeatedly about what happened in that room. He thinks it was her steady confirmation of it that drove it home. “Yes,” she said again and again. “It was mind control. Modell used it on multiple people to drive them to harm themselves.” She defended him tirelessly. Of course; the dalliant Agent Scully, who never believes unless it's really, really inconvenient for her own sake.

He closes his eyes and tries not to see a gun, tries not to see the barrel of it leveled at Scully, the cool metal beneath his palm, his hand on the trigger…

“Mulder,” she says in an even voice somewhere behind him. He ducks his head. He can't look at her. She could be dead right now, another one of Modell’s victims, but by his hand, so it would have been his fault. He could be calling her mother right now. _Sorry, Mrs. Scully, both your daughters died from a bullet to the head, and both deaths were my fault…_

“Mulder, look at me,” Scully  says.

He turns. She's finally taken her vest off. She's staring up at him, carefully as if she knows how close he is to shattering.

“You shouldn't have defended me,” he says.

“It wasn't your fault,” she says automatically.

“I would have killed you, Scully!” he says, too harshly, smacking his palm against the white wall.

“No,” she says, somewhat coldly. “No, you would've killed yourself before you killed me.”

He flinches, remembering the metal against his temple, her scream, the horror on her face.

“Can you imagine what that was like, Mulder?” she says, her voice cracking. She presses her fingers to her mouth. “Thinking I would have to watch you die, knowing I wouldn't be able to save you…”

She hugs him tentatively, her head resting against his Kevlar shoulder. He doesn't move to return the gesture. He doesn't deserve to hug her.

“It's been a hard day,” she says. “We're both shaken up. But this was _not your fault_ , Mulder. You've seen proof of that yourself, in your own theory. I saw you. You fought it with everything you could.”

He sees it again, the gun barrel, feels the trigger beneath his finger. Feels it give way, sees Scully fall with the same horrified look on her face… He would've never talked to her again, and that would be the worst part, wouldn't it, that she'd be gone and he wouldn't have anyone who looks at him that way, like he matters, like they care...

He bites down hard on a sob. “Fuck, Scully,” he says, hugging her back, tightly as if she'll fall away. “It's your birthday, isn't it?”

 

ii.

How many times has he expected her to be dead on her birthday? Last year, it was the cancer; two years ago, fucking Modell. Funny, just weeks ago, he was watching her bleed out because of Modell. They've been given a two week suspension for the Ronnie Strickland incident (honestly, he's not sure any of them know how to deal with it, considering the part where he came back to life), and he's been somewhat restless. And worried about her, because how can he help it, with everything that's happened.

Mulder shows up at her apartment around six. He holds up a package of Hostess cupcakes when she opens the door. “Happy birthday.”

“Is it going to be a tradition to bring each other vending machine pastries on our birthdays?” She lets him in, closing the door behind him.

“Apparently,” he says, handing her the package. She takes one cupcake, and passes him the other. “At least it's not drugged pizza.”

“Oh, fuck you,” she says, somewhat good naturedly.

They've been somewhat muted lately, still recovering from everything that happened in January, Emily and Linda Bowman's depiction of Scully’s death. He's sorry for what happened in Chaney, doesn't know how to say it. He wakes up gasping her name now, reaching across the sheets as if she’d be there. There are so many times where he thinks she won't make it to another birthday. The fact that she has is remarkable, really.

“Any plans tonight?” he asks, and means _can I stay?_

“No, Mom's still in California with Bill and Tara and Matthew. I'm free and clear.” She adds a smile to the end of the sentence, meant to be reassuring, he's sure.

They end up on the couch. Some movie that isn't important plays. Scully flips channels for several long minutes, grimacing at _The Simpsons_ because her little girl had watched it from her hospital bed. Mulder watches her when she isn't looking, the blue light of the TV playing across her face. Her hand is stretched out to the center of the couch, but he's still surprised when her fingers nudge his. He curls his hand around hers like a viper, their fingers intertwining like vines. Her hand is half the size of his, and he can feel her pulse against the tip of his index finger. She squeezes briefly before turning her attention back to the TV.

Later, he's still holding her hand after she's dozed off, her hair spread out on the leather. He drapes a knit blanket over her, and traces lines on her palm before leaving.

 

iii.

He misses them so much it hurts sometimes, the push-pull of should I go back-if I go back, this is all over. He's wondered more than once why they haven't been used against him, his family, the only thing worth living for. It's her birthday. He should be there.

He sends her an email because he can't resist, keeps it simple: _Happy birthday. I miss you._ I love you is what he mouths at the screen of the worn-out computer. He wonders how big their son is now.

He receives an encrypted message from the Gunmen an hour later. _Scully needs to talk to you._ Somehow, Mulder has the underlying feeling that this is about more than that she misses him, too, and the thought scares him half to death.

In a hidden chat room created by the Gunmen, she tells him about William's abduction. He curses out loud for a long minute, and wipes his eyes furiously. His son could have died, and he wouldn't have even known about it. He's oblivious here, to Scully and William's safety. He can't protect them here.

 _I thought you were dead,_ Scully says, and he can picture her hunched over her laptop, hands shaking as she types.

 _I'm coming home_ , he types back. He needs to see them, needs to hold his son in his arms, needs to talk to Scully in person, needs for them to be a family.

 _No!_ she says. _You can't. It's still dangerous here._

 _Scully, I can't protect you two if I'm not there_.

_I'm not going to lose you again._

He winces at this, tightens his hand around the edge of the table. He wants to go home. William is growing up, and he'll be a year old soon. It's her birthday. He needs to be there. He actually remembered it this year.

Mulder sighs, types _ok._

 

iv.

She's still buried under blankets, hair hanging in her face. “Snow day, Scully,” he whispers, slipping his hands under the covers.

She wakes up, yips when his cold hands meet her skin. “Jesus, Mulder,” she hisses, eyes still closed. “Did you feel the more than compulsive need to stick your hands in a snowbank?”

“Course not, Scully,” he scoffs. “I was just checking to make sure that there's _no fathomable way_ you can go into work today.”

She opens one eye with interest. “And is there?”

He kisses her neck. “I could barely even get out on the porch. Welcome to West Virginia in February.”

“Mmm,” she says. “So what you're saying is I can go back to sleep.”

He opens his mouth to protest, and sees she is smirking at him. “It's your _birthday_ , Scully,” he says fervently, tugging at her hand.

“Ugh. Don't remind me,” she groans.

“I made hot drinks if that helps anything,” he offers.

“Mmm,” she says, slightly more.enthusiastic. “Bring the coffee to bed.”

“Hot chocolate?”

“ _Coffee._ ”

Mulder lets out a huff of air. “You're boring on your birthday, you know that?”

She kisses him before he leaves. “I know,” she says. “Hurry back to bed, Mulder.”

 

v.

He wakes slower than normal, regaining consciousness for several minutes before opening his eyes. He is slumped in the passenger seat of her car, and Scully is driving, circles under her eyes, auburn hair in tangled waves around her face.

“Scully,” he croaks.

It takes her a full minute to look at him. “Mulder, thank God,” she whispers, moving one hand from the steering wheel to wind around his in a death grip. A dog yips somewhere in the back, but he can't turn his head to investigate.  

“What happened?” he says. “There was a light…” He thought she was going to be taken again and he wouldn't be able to save her, thought he was too late again.

“We got away, Mulder,” she whispers. “We're going to find William.”

“William?” he repeats. He imagines, not the first time, their teenaged son - smart, quietly funny, his mother's sarcasm and strength. He imagines him scared, maybe for his adoptive family and everyone he's ever known, maybe for himself. Maybe he's already dead.

“Yes,” she promises, squeezing his hand again. “It's going to be okay.”

He's tired, probably the most tired he's ever been in his life, almost certainly dying. But his attention is caught when Scully turns on her phone at the cue of a buzz, and he sees the date. “Scully,” he says. “It's February 23.”

“Wha- oh,” she says quietly, like she doesn't want to remember.

“I'll live for you, Scully,” he whispers. “Sorry I couldn't do better.” He'd actually had something, and that was the funny thing. It's stashed in the bottom drawer of their desk. He shouldn't have gone chasing a ghost, should have been beside her.

“Mulder,” she whispers back, blinking hard. “That's the best thing you could give me.”


End file.
